Wikipedia

2
Annotations

"The Holy Roman Empire was a mainly Central European conglomeration of lands in the Middle Ages and the early modern period. It was also known as the Holy Roman Empire of the German Nation after the 16th-century reforms in the Reich. [Ratisbon (Regsnsburg), shown as its capital on the Google map (above) was the permanent seat of its diet 1663-1806.]....After the Peace of Westphalia in 1648, which gave the territories almost complete sovereignty, even allowing them to form independent alliances with other states, the Empire was only a mere conglomeration of largely independent states. By the rise of Louis XIV of France, the Holy Roman Empire as such had lost all power and clout in major European politics." http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holy_Roman_Empire